Turkish FM to visit Myanmar to raise awareness

ANKARA - Hürriyet Daily News

As part of efforts to raise awareness of a recent massacre of Rohingya or Arakan Muslims in western Myanmar, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu will visit the country on Aug. 8.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s wife, Emine Erdoğan, and daughter, Sümeyye Erdoğan, and the foreign minister’s wife, Sare Davutoğlu, will accompany the FM. Davutoğlu will meet with Myanmar government officials on Aug. 9 to discuss both the humanitarian aid efforts being carried out by Turkey and the Rohingya Muslims’ situation.

Turkish authorities are working to deliver humanitarian aid to the Rohingya Muslims, but it’s not clear yet if the aid will be brought on Davutoğlu’s plane, a Turkish official told the Hürriyet Daily News. Myanmar generally allows humanitarian aid only through U.N. organizations. Some countries, including the U.S., have brought supplies to the region, but most of the aid is being held outside the country awaiting permission from Myanmar’s government to deliver it.

There is also a Turkish monument and mausoleum in Myanmar at a site where 1,500 Turkish soldiers who were captured by U.K. forces during World War I were laid to rest. The mausoleum was damaged in a storm, and Turkey has begun to work on its restoration. Meanwhile, renewed violence between Buddhists and Muslim Rohingya has left three people dead and five others wounded, a government official said yesterday, amid growing international concern about the sectarian unrest.